Cultural Misappropriation

Cultural misappropriation, also known as cultural appropriation, is when people or in these cases brands, adopt elements from a minority culture, and make it appropriate for members of the dominant culture. A major hot topic at the moment is cultural appropriation in fashion.

Cultural appropriation in fashion has been happening for what seems like forever. However, the recent combination of the eagle-eyed consumer, picking up on every detail on the catwalk, and the uncontrollable power of social media, the impact of this in fashion is much larger, and can offend a considerably wider audience.

Cultural appropriation can be seen by an individual posting an unfortunate fashion decision on social media, and it is going viral with outrage, but also by big and influential fashion brands. I can understand the odd individuals reckless fashion choice, that wasn’t intended to go so public culturally offending some people. It is the larger Brands however, that you would think to have researched and forecasted such outrage from their choices a lot better than they have.

Just this year it was one of the most renowned and influential brands currently, that where in the spotlight for perhaps the most careless example of Cultural misappropriation the fashion industry has ever seen. Gucci put turbans on their models for a catwalk, simply as fashion accessories. Members of the Sikh religion where understandably offended by the use of a deeply symbolic and important religious statement being used in this way. I shocked by the lack of consideration by such a large brand, which would have involved teams of people who also failed to see how this would offend. However, I was also so surprised that something like this could happen in this day and age, where people are a lot more educated culturally, and don’t have the same excuses they may have in the past, especially not a mainstream brand like Gucci.

Another recent example of cultural appropriation shown by a big brand was in the 2017 Victoria’s secret show. The use of native American style headdresses on the catwalk was seen as copying and devaluing aboriginal culture by some. Others argued that as this wasn’t as much of a current culture, as it was a part of history, this wasn’t as bad as the Gucci example. However, such a big brand does not have any excuse for not seeing how this may offend a culture, by appropriating past of its history.

Marc Jacobs also came into fire when they used dreadlock headdresses on their mainly white models. People often see this hairstyle as associated or belonging to black culture, and where therefore offended by this. Others however argued that hairstyles should no longer be something specific to race, and that by still pinning it to a certain race or culture, that in its self is racist.

In examples like these it is clear that people disagree, and that what people consider cultural misappropriation varies. I do believe though, that bigger brands with so much influence on social media cannot afford to make such potentially offensive mistakes. The larger brands have a responsibility with their success, to be aware of the times, of people picking up and analyzing everything. They should always research the contexts of their ideas thoroughly as they know the large variety of people their content can reach. The examples above I do not believe have done this, and I see their attempts and lazy and insensitive.

When researching I started to think about some of the reasons why cultural misappropriation is still around, and even becoming more common recently. I think that the bottom line is that designers are desperate for ideas and sales. The Fashion cycle of the old styles constantly coming back around has always worked. However, with this much faster fashion industry, and consumers and brands constant hunger for new styles, designers feel pressured to come up with new ideas. With the knowledge that new ideas are often successfully influenced by the old they have taken it too far. Designers have began to delve into styles of cultures that still have relevance, and deep meaning to people in the culture.

Overall I believe that designers (particularly of larger brands) need to be more mindful of the line between using the past and cultures as inspiration, and aspects of culture that is still very significant for those people and would not be received well when used as Fashion.